Ashwin Raises Questions Over Indian Opener’s T20I Exclusion

Ravichandran Ashwin has raised some questions on the BCCI selectors for the exclusion of the Indian opener. With India's T20I team going through major changes, one player has been overlooked for some time. It has been months since his last appearance for the Indian team came.

1. Ashwin's View on Gaikwad's Exclusion

He said, “We do not need to talk about Ruturaj Gaikwad's class. He's got all the shots in the book. The only thing is there is no information as to why he is not in the scene after his last T20 series. When he played the last T20 the coach was different, the captain was different. The issue is if there is no communication with such players they will largely be left in the dark. I really hope he is being communicated to. He is batting brilliantly in red ball as well. I hope they consider him for a middle-order role.”

Along with that, Ravichandran Ashwin also talked about the role of aggressive batting style in the opening slot. For this, he used the example of Abhishek Sharma and said, “In modern-day T20 cricket, you will not be selected as an opener if you come with a strike-rate of less than 145. I am very sorry to say. You like players like Virat Kohli, Shubman Gill, all these players who are setting it up for you. You could win the T20 World Cup because how Virat played in the final against South Africa. But when you have players like these on one side, you need to fight on the other side. That's why Rohit took it upon himself.”

As of now, the Indian team has Abhishek Sharma and Shubman Gill as their openers in the T20I format. It can also be said that Abhishek Sharma is competing with Yashasvi Jaiswal for the opening slot, as both of them are aggressive batsmen.

Ruturaj Gaikwad has played a vital role for the Indian team in the T20I format. He made his debut for the team in 2021, and played several matches till the series against Zimbabwe. Despite being able to perform well for the team, he was not able to get his name to the T20 World Cup 2024 line-up.

He played his first T20I match against Sri Lanka in Colombo in 2021. In that game, he played in the absence of Rohit Sharma and opened with Shikhar Dhawan. Despite that being his debut game, Gaikwad looked great in touch and scored 21 runs for the team in 18 balls. Unfortunately, the match didn't go in India's favour as the team lost by 4 wickets.

Ruturaj Gaikwad in T20Is:

The last T20I series played by Ruturaj Gaikwad for the Indian team was back in 2024. It was against Zimbabwe, just after the team had won the T20 World Cup. Gaikwad ended up scoring 133 runs for the team in that series at an average of 66.50. Since that series, he has not been included in India's squad for any T20I series.